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8.4 - Brainstem Death Testing

from Section 8 - End-of-Life Care

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 July 2023

By
Shankara Nagaraja
Edited by
Ned Gilbert-Kawai ,
Debashish Dutta  and
Carl Waldmann
Ned Gilbert-Kawai
Affiliation:
The Royal Liverpool Hospital
Debashish Dutta
Affiliation:
Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust, Harlow
Carl Waldmann
Affiliation:
Royal Berkshire Hospital, Reading
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Summary

Key Learning Points

  1. 1. Brainstem death tests are a set of clinical tests of brainstem function.

  2. 2. There must be an established cause of irreversible brain damage.

  3. 3. The apnoea test is the final test.

  4. 4. The official time of death is the time of completion of first set of tests.

  5. 5. Exercise caution in patients treated with therapeutic hypothermia.

Keywords

brain death and diagnosisbrainstem death and diagnosisapnoea testbrainstem reflexbrainstem death and testneurological criteria of death
Type
Chapter
Information
Intensive Care Medicine
The Essential Guide
 , pp. 680 - 682
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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References

References and Further Reading

Academy of the Medical Royal Colleges. A code of practice for the diagnosis and confirmation of death. London: Academy of the Medical Royal Colleges; 2008.Google Scholar
Bersten, AD, Soni, N (eds). Oh’s Intensive Care Manual, 7th edn. Butterworth Heinemann Elsevier; 2014.Google Scholar
Cameron, JE, Bellini, A, Damian, MS, Breen, DP. Confirmation of brain-stem death. Pract Neurol 2016;16:129–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oram, J, Murphy, P. Diagnosis of death. Contin Educ Anaesth Crit Care Pain 2011;11:77–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Webb, AC, Samuels, OB. Reversible brain death after cardiopulmonary arrest and induced hypothermia. Crit Care Med 2011;39:1538–42.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed

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